So It Goes: Cat talk

Not that my husband and I don’t hold sparkling conversations at times, but as a rule it is a bit one sided.  Either he’s chatty or I am – and it’s mostly me.

I must be getting tired of my own conversation or something, but lately, I have realised that I regularly hold conversations with our cat.

It’s a bit similar really to talking to yourself or to your husband, except my cat genuinely seems interested.  She stops, gives me her blue-eyed attention, purrs occasionally then wraps herself around my leg like fairy floss.  I take this as cat appreciation for the many deep and meaningful things I have just shared.

At this point I might tickle her behind her ears or turn on the tap for her to drink from (she only drinks running water) or quietly resign myself to having white fur on black clothing for the rest of the day as I pick her up.

So intense has our conversation been of late that I have found myself increasingly making household chit chat with my conversation companion.  The first ‘hello’ to in the morning is to my cat.  I say ‘good night’ to her when I go to bed and always greet her when I come home from work.  Actually I tell her many things, most of them boring, like the fact that I might be going outside to hang out the washing, making a quick phone call or heading out for half an hour.  She doesn’t seem to discriminate between the deeply fascinating the banal.  She gives me the same appreciative purrs.

My husband has his own hilarious repartee when he arrives home and that is to say ‘Hi Ratbag’, making out that he speaking to the cat, then actually speak to the cat in the cutesy exclusive feline language these two share, reinforcing that the initial “Hi ratbag” was hilariously intended for myself.

There is no doubt that he has some pretty predictable banter not only with me but with the cat and I can anticipate this word for word, as he enters the house.  I wonder if our cat waits for it too.  She’s probably thinking:’ Oh here we go, that Ratbag word is meant for that mad woman who talks to me.”  Then she too wraps herself around my husband’s legs.